I just saw this movie last night for the first time and I must say I was deeply impressed. As a child of the "talkie" era - and as one who has a love of great dialogue - I am not prone to watching silents. However, this one is well worth it: its composition and lighting, as well as its ability to create an effective atmosphere, work to draw the viewer in. Furthermore, the *faces* in this movie - Gowland as McTeague and (particularly!) Zasu Pitts as Trina - are so vivid and compelling, and the story so inherently tense and dramatic, that dialogue is not missed nearly as much as it could be (I won't go so far as to say it's not missed at all, though - I simply am a fan of great dialogue, and for me no silent can ever be as effective as a talkie; sorry, that's my bias and I'm sticking to it).
The reason I rented the film at all was because I read the novel "McTeague" for a literature class in college, and stills from the movie were included in the book (they looked intriguing). Now, I must say that I rather detested the book: it was written in much too heavy-handed a style, was relentlessly crude and depressing, and it awarded itself far too much significance in using this rather maudlin and melodramatic story to draw supposedly "profound" truths about the human condition. I bring this up for two reasons. It is often remarked (and usually rightly so) how a particular movie can never be as rich and satisfying as the novel it came from. This is because a novel has more space to develop its story and, more importantly, greater latitude in affording psychological insights into its characters.
With "McTeague/Greed," however, the opposite is true. Since the story is so tawdry and melodramatic to begin with, it is actually better served by film, a more naturally sensationalistic medium (particularly silent film), where outsize characters and emotions are more at home. Furthermore, the transfer allows the tale to be streamlined to its bare bones, and the ham-fisted moralizing and ruminations of the author to be excised. Having read the book, I can well imagine what was included in Stroheim's initial nine hour cut - and, believe me, I don't feel the loss. If anyone is curious, they can simply read the novel and picture it for themselves. As for the rest of us, what we get in the two hour version is all we really need to know for the story to work - in fact, any more of this story and, frankly, it would be held up for what it is: a preposterous and grotesquely inflated tale. In the book, for example, there are two or three sub-plots which add nothing to the story but time, and cutting them represents an actual improvement. Would anyone feel, for example, that The Godfather would have been a better movie if Coppola had included scenes (found in the book) of Johnny Fontane's carousing, or Lucy Mancini's sexual problems and her need for vaginal surgery? Of course not!
What I'm saying, then, is that, much as we instinctively tend to sympathize with artists and creators in their struggles against the bean counters and money men - in this case, I believe the studio made the right choice. "Greed" is a powerful movie. The natural inclination is for people to believe that it would have been even MORE powerful had the fullness of Stroheim's vision been allowed to come to light. In fact, the exact opposite is true: "Greed" is so good *because* it has been so tightened and foreshortened. So please, people, let's drop this pose of regret and disgruntlement, and simply enjoy the film for what it is: one of the greatest and most effective silent movies of all time.
The reason I rented the film at all was because I read the novel "McTeague" for a literature class in college, and stills from the movie were included in the book (they looked intriguing). Now, I must say that I rather detested the book: it was written in much too heavy-handed a style, was relentlessly crude and depressing, and it awarded itself far too much significance in using this rather maudlin and melodramatic story to draw supposedly "profound" truths about the human condition. I bring this up for two reasons. It is often remarked (and usually rightly so) how a particular movie can never be as rich and satisfying as the novel it came from. This is because a novel has more space to develop its story and, more importantly, greater latitude in affording psychological insights into its characters.
With "McTeague/Greed," however, the opposite is true. Since the story is so tawdry and melodramatic to begin with, it is actually better served by film, a more naturally sensationalistic medium (particularly silent film), where outsize characters and emotions are more at home. Furthermore, the transfer allows the tale to be streamlined to its bare bones, and the ham-fisted moralizing and ruminations of the author to be excised. Having read the book, I can well imagine what was included in Stroheim's initial nine hour cut - and, believe me, I don't feel the loss. If anyone is curious, they can simply read the novel and picture it for themselves. As for the rest of us, what we get in the two hour version is all we really need to know for the story to work - in fact, any more of this story and, frankly, it would be held up for what it is: a preposterous and grotesquely inflated tale. In the book, for example, there are two or three sub-plots which add nothing to the story but time, and cutting them represents an actual improvement. Would anyone feel, for example, that The Godfather would have been a better movie if Coppola had included scenes (found in the book) of Johnny Fontane's carousing, or Lucy Mancini's sexual problems and her need for vaginal surgery? Of course not!
What I'm saying, then, is that, much as we instinctively tend to sympathize with artists and creators in their struggles against the bean counters and money men - in this case, I believe the studio made the right choice. "Greed" is a powerful movie. The natural inclination is for people to believe that it would have been even MORE powerful had the fullness of Stroheim's vision been allowed to come to light. In fact, the exact opposite is true: "Greed" is so good *because* it has been so tightened and foreshortened. So please, people, let's drop this pose of regret and disgruntlement, and simply enjoy the film for what it is: one of the greatest and most effective silent movies of all time.